It is hard for bands to come to South Florida since Florida’s panhandle is very out of the way from the rest of the country. Hundreds of times we have seen bands map their world tours and hundreds of times we have been left disappointed to see the schedule cities list with ours omitted. It’s a sad thing for the music fans in this part of the country.
But as all sad stories this one brings some lights among the shadows, enter the good people at West Palm Beach’s Sunfest. Taking off where Langerado dropped the ball last year, the Sunfest is bringing some of the biggest rock acts to our state. Since 1982 the West Palm Beach music festival has been entertaining Floridians and visitors that are not only looking for great bands to check out, but also for the wonderful art exhibits and great food.
Sunfest 2010, taking place from April 28th to May 2nd, is looking all kind of good. Not only will be taking place in the beautiful waterfront of West Palm Beach, but it will bring two of the biggest acts in rock music. During the opening night, Weezer will be playing. Rivers Cuosmo and company will bring their melodies and catchy guitars to Florida after a hiatus of more than 4 years when they were promoting their album Make Believe. Now, after two more albums under their belt, the veteran rock band is ready to rock Floridians once more.
The main dish for me comes during the second night of the festival. The Flaming Lips from Oklahoma will be performing. The Flips are a great psycodelic rock band that put so many props in their concerts that makes them unforgettable. I’ve seen this band four times in the past, and can’t wait to see them at this year’s Sunfest. Nice grab Sunfest! One bummer is, though, that the Flips are going to be conflicting with rock and roll legends ZZ Top. I’ll try to catch them both somehow.

The summer of music festivals in the U.S. is officially on its way with California’s Coachella kicking it off this next weekend. Here in SOYPRENSA we get very excited about this time of the year, not only here in the U.S., but in Europe as well. This year SOYPRENSA will be bringing you full coverage of some of this festivals via tweeter and doing reviews of these great shows.
Our first target here in the United States is Perry Farrell’s Lollapalooza. Lollapalooza will take place at the Grant Park in Chicago, Illinois on the weekend of August 6th to the 8th. Known as one of the most respected and longest running festival in the country, running since 1991 and being reborn in 2003 due to a hiatus from 1997 to 2003 (Probably due to Limp Bizkit and Creed’s best efforts to destroy music), the festival has been the platform for bands such as The Smashing Pumpkins, Pearl Jam, The Red Hot Chilly Peppers and Nine Inch Nails.
This year Lolla’s line up can make other festivals jealous because it has it all, a big band reuniting, hipster’s number one band, up and comers indie music bands, bona fide alternative stars and Lady GaGa. The announcement if Lady GaGa as one of this year’s headliners stirred controversy and was quickly defended by Perry Farrell in an interview for Rolling Stone, Farrell said :

“Lady Gaga represents to me the music industry today. She’s a good representation of where it’s at and where everybody’s trying to get to. If you look at the Grammys, it looked like everybody was trying to catch up to Lady Gaga. We just see the vision of Lady Gaga in Chicago in Grant Park surrounded by all those beautiful buildings—we all just thought that it would be an epic performance… She had a real interest in doing it as well because she felt like we had given her a break to go into the world of legitimate music, you know not just pop.”

While Paul McCartney only briefly graced the Hard Rock Calling stage with Neil Young last year to duet The Beatles “A Day in the Life,” the living legend will be headlining the event this year. Sir Paul will play on the closing night, Saturday 27 June. Slated to perform Beatles hits as well as solo work, McCartney’s presence is quickly pushing Hard Rock Calling to the top of the festival list for Summer 2010.

Hard Rock Calling is entering its fifth year at Hyde Park and though the full lineup is yet to be announced, what’s been leaked out so far is looking stellar. Friday 25 June has The Gaslight Anthem returning after a year of steadily raking in awards and coinciding nicely with the June release of their third album, American Slang. Wolfmother and Ben Harper & Relentless7 will also be playing on the 25th, but it’s Pearl Jam that will headlining on the Main Stage, bringing their Seattle roots overseas and planting them briefly in Hyde Park as part of their tour to promote their latest release, Backspacer. Expatriate and The Hives will be tearing things up the Pepsi Max Stage, showing ups fine folks of London how the international community likes to shake it. Aside from Sir Paul, Saturday 26 June’s lineup is still a shiny, shiny secret.

Tickets can be bought online from the official website (http://www.hardrockcalling.co.uk), Paul McCartney will set you back £62.50 and Pearl Jam £47.50. Those two are the only performances currently listed on the site. Tickets can also be purchased from the on-site box office on the day of the event, subject to availability. Tickets will not be available via Ticketmaster.

Set times will not be available until the week of the event, though the headliner will always be last on stage with each day scheduled to finish at approximately 22:30.

There will be no readmission to the event should you leave at any time during the day.

The Castell de Peralda Festival is by no means afraid of the crisis, and so it shows its early line up which stars Norah Jones. This is the only concert that the NortAmerican songwriter will give in Catalunya. Furthermore, the 8 time Grammy winner will be presenting “The Fall,” her latest album. The festival will take place during the months of July and August in Peralda, a small town located only 150 Km from Barcelona and which has an array of neverending cultural offer. So don´t miss out on this opportunity and get your tix by clicking here.